Quoted By:
We can build models of many things, but there are some things that should be noted about models in general:
1 – a model can’t contain everything in the entire world, because the model is built inside the world
2- the model is not an exact copy of the thing it is modelling – if it was it would not be a model
3- the model cannot contain an exact copy of itself – that would be recursion
The reason models are useful:
1 – the model can operate faster than the thing it is modelling, therefore permit prediction
2- the model can simulate unwanted events without the need for letting them happen
3- we can create multiple models
Maths is a model made using labels of similarity. Say we have one pencil. We know what a pencil is and what it does, and we might have other pencils that we also label as such. we are then going create a new label, the number of pencils in a group. We can for example would be to say we have 10 pencils. Each pencil is a little different, and we might have some coloured ones, some sharper than others, etc, but it can be a useful thing to say, “we have 10 of these things, each one being called a pencil”.
The key point is that in our model, we have reduced each pencil to a conceptual pencil being defined as equal to all the rest of the items in the group, and given a definition to the group as a whole. This reductionism leads to useful models of the world. Because all oxygen atoms behave the same, they can be counted and models created based on the consistent properties of multiples of the single atom. Even though a model will always contain at least a little error, it can still be useful.
Whether or not we can create a theory of everything is left as an exercise for the reader
